CONCERNING THE HOLY AFRICAN MARTYRS: ARMOGASTES THE COUNT, ARCHINIMUS MASCULINUS, AND SATURUS THE ROYAL PROCURATOR.
AROUND THE YEAR 460.
PrefaceArmogastes the Count, Martyr in Africa (Saint)
Archinimus Masculinus, or Mascula the Arch-mime, Martyr in Africa (Saint)
Saturus, Royal Procurator, Martyr in Africa (Saint)
[1] Victor of Utica -- or Vita -- Bishop in Africa, deserved exceedingly well of very many Saints, whose glorious contests, undertaken for the orthodox faith during the Vandal persecution under the Arian Kings Geiseric and Huneric, the Acts are given from Victor of Utica he described as a contemporary author in three books, having composed his history in the sixtieth year after the Vandals had crossed into Africa, under the Emperor Zeno, around the year of Christ 487. At the end of his first book he depicts the triumph of these three Confessors of Christ, whose memory the Catholic Church celebrates on this day. And first, the manuscript Martyrology of Dijon has the following: "In Africa, the Confessors Armogastes, Archinimus, and Satyrus." The same is read in the manuscript Vallicellian and the Trier manuscript of St. Paulinus, and they are honored with the epithet of holy Confessors. In the Liege manuscript of St. Lambert the name of the second sacred veneration in ancient Martyrologies is written Arginimus; in the Vatican manuscript of St. Peter's, the Brussels one of St. Gudula, the Centula one of St. Riquier, and the manuscript Florarium, it is Archiminus. With that name omitted, the following is found in the Cassino manuscript: "The birthday of the holy Confessors Hermogastes and Satyrus." The name of the first is written Armogastis in the cited Liege and Trier manuscripts and passim in other sources, which adorn them with a longer eulogy. Of these, Ado has the following: "In Africa, the holy Confessors Armogastes, Archinimus, and Satyrus, who during the time of the Vandal persecution under the Arian King Geiseric, [being most illustrious members of the Church, and frequently rebuking the depravity of the Arians with Catholic liberty,] suffered many and grievous punishments and insults for the confession of the truth, and completed the course of their glorious contest." The same is read in Notker, who writes Archimimus, and in the author of the Martyrology published under the name of Bede; and with the few words we have enclosed in parentheses omitted, in Usuard, Bellinus, and others; and at the 4th day of December in various manuscript Martyrologies. In today's Roman Martyrology the following is read: "In Africa, the holy Confessors Armogastes the Count, and the Roman Martyrology Mascula the Arch-mime, and Saturus, Procurator of the Royal House, who during the time of the Vandal persecution under the Arian King Genseric, suffered many and grievous punishments and insults for the confession of the truth, and completed the course of their glorious contest."
[2] Baronius, much concerned about St. Mascula, found in no earlier Martyrology or Calendar, makes these annotations: "Another reading from an ancient copy of Victor has thus: the true reading is St. Archinimus 'Archimimus of Mascula,' as if from Mascula, a most noble city in Africa and in the province of Numidia." This reading is more pleasing to Molanus in his annotations on Usuard in the second edition. "I would approve the same, if anyone could persuade me that Archimimus was ever the proper name of any Christian. For if stage-actors and players and others of that kind were not admitted to holy baptism unless they had first renounced those theatrical exercises, how would a name of notable obscenity not have been washed away and changed with baptism?" These and other things Baronius says, who did not sufficiently attend to the words of Molanus, who asserts that the codices of Victor erroneously have "a certain Archimimus, named Mascula." The true reading, consistent with the Martyrologies, is found in the very ancient and first edition, chapter 13: "a certain Archinimus, named Masculinus," that is, from the city of Mascula. Behold, he reports that the reading is Archinimus, not Archimimus. We have the history of Victor published at Cologne in the year 1537 by Eucharius, in which on page 25 it reads thus: "But neither do I pass over a certain Archinimus named Masculinus." Which is read in the same way in Victor among the Monumenta Sanctorum Patrum Orthodoxographa, printed at Basel in the year 1569. And this reading is most consistent with the Martyrologies. Certainly Archinimus is read in Usuard and Ado, and this in the principal and most ancient manuscript codices, even in our manuscript Usuard, which once belonged to Augustin Hunne, which Molanus used chiefly in his editions; so that it is surprising to find in him not Archinimus but Archiminus -- which reading is nevertheless found in some manuscripts. Bellinus in his Martyrology according to the use of the Roman Curia has Archinimus. Marguerin de la Bigne in the Bibliotheca Patrum printed at Paris in the year 1575 was the first to publish "a certain Archimimus, named Mascula," which Molanus in the second edition of Usuard in the year 1583 criticizes. Meanwhile it reads thus in other editions of the Bibliotheca Patrum and in the Ecclesiastical Annals of Baronius at the year 456; which reading is also preserved by Pierre-Francois Chifflet in his edition of this Victor.
EPITOME OF THE LIFE
From Book 1 of the History of Victor of Utica.
Armogastes the Count, Martyr in Africa (Saint)
Archinimus Masculinus, or Mascula the Arch-mime, Martyr in Africa (Saint)
Saturus, Royal Procurator, Martyr in Africa (Saint)
BHL Number: 0000
FROM VICTOR OF UTICA.
[1] Elsewhere, as happened at Thunazuda, at the village of Galibus in Ammonia, and in other places, St. Armogastes suffered dire torments at the time when the Sacraments of God were being administered to the people, they (the Arians) entering with the greatest fury, the Body
of Christ and the Blood they scattered upon the pavements and trampled them with their polluted feet. For Geiseric himself had decreed, at the persuasion of his bishops, that within his palace and those of his sons, only Arians should be placed in the various offices. Among others they then came to our Armogastes, whose shins they long and repeatedly tortured, binding them with twanging cords; and tearing open his forehead -- on which Christ had fixed the standard of his Cross -- showing it more furrowed than plowed and roaring. But the sinews snapped like spider's threads while the Saint looked up to heaven. When the torturers saw that the sinew cords had been broken, they frequently brought stronger cords and hempen ones; but while he invoked nothing other than the name of Christ, all those things came to nothing. Moreover, while he hung head downward by one foot, he seemed to all to be sleeping as if upon a bed spread with feathers. When Theodoric, the King's son, who was his master, seeing that the punishments were of no avail, he is condemned to digging ditches and tending cattle ordered him to be beheaded, he was prevented by his own priest Jocundus, who said to him: "You can kill him by various afflictions; but if you put him to death by the sword, the Romans will begin to proclaim him a Martyr." Then Theodoric condemned him to digging ditches in the province of Byzacena. Afterwards, as if for a greater insult, not far from Carthage, where he could be seen by all, he appointed him to be a herdsman of cattle.
[2] Meanwhile, by the Lord's revelation, when he perceived that the day of his death was near, he dies piously he summoned a certain Felix, a venerable Christian and Procurator of the house of the King's son, who venerated Armogastes as an Apostle, and said to him: "The time of my dissolution has come; I beseech you by the faith that we both hold, to deign to bury me under this carob tree, for you shall render an account to our Lord if you do not do so" -- not that he cared where or how his body might be buried, but so that what God had revealed to his servant might be made manifest. Felix answered and said: "Far be it from us, venerable Confessor; but I shall bury you in one of the basilicas with the triumph and grace that you deserve." To whom Blessed Armogastes said: "No, but you shall do what I have said." he is buried under the holm-oak in a marble tomb He, fearing to sadden the man of God, truthfully promised to do what he had commanded. Immediately within a very few days the Count of good confession departed from this life. Felix hastened to dig the sepulcher entrusted to him under the tree; and when the intertwined roots and the hardness of the dry earth caused delay, and he was troubled by the labor because the limbs of the holy body were being buried too slowly, at length, having cut the roots and digging the earth much deeper, he beheld a sarcophagus of the most splendid marble, prepared there -- such as perhaps no king whatsoever ever had.
[3] But neither should I pass over a certain Archinimus, named Masculinus, who, when he was pressed by many snares St. Archinimus to abandon the Catholic faith, the King himself afterwards tried to entice him with flattering secular addresses, promising to heap him with many riches if he would lend a willing ear to his wishes. under the sword of one threatening to kill, he remains a strong Confessor But when he remained brave and unconquered, the King ordered him to undergo a capital sentence -- yet the crafty one secretly commanded that if in that hour he should fear the stroke of the brandished sword, they should rather kill him, lest they make him a glorious Martyr; but if they should see him strong in his confession, they should withhold the sword. But he, like an immovable column, made strong with Christ's support, returned a glorious Confessor; and though the envious enemy was unwilling to make him a Martyr, he was nevertheless unable to violate our Confessor.
[4] We also knew another man of that period, named Saturus, who, being a bright member of the Church of Christ St. Saturus loses all his goods and frequently rebuking the depravity of the Arians with Catholic freedom (he was the Procurator of the household of Huneric), was approached, at the accusation of a certain deacon Marivadus, whom the ill-fated Huneric held in singular honor, to become an Arian. Honors and great riches were promised if he complied; dire punishments were prepared if he refused. This choice was proposed: that if he did not obey the royal commands, first an investigation would be made, and after losing his home and property and having all his slaves and children taken from him, his wife, in his presence, would be given in marriage to a camel-driver. But he, full of God, rather provoked the impious ones that this should come to pass more quickly. For which reason his wife appears to have sought a delay from those executing the order, without her husband's knowledge. Another Eve approaches her husband, schooled in the counsel of the serpent. But he was not the Adam who would touch the alluring fruits of the forbidden tree; for he was not called "Wanting" but Saturus -- "sated with the abundance of the house of God and given drink from the torrent of his delights." The woman came to the place where her husband was praying alone, he bravely rejects his wife's temptation with rent garments and loosened hair, accompanied by her children, and carrying in her hands one infant girl who was still nursing, who was cast at the feet of her unknowing husband. She herself also embraced his knees with her arms, hissing with the voice of a dragon: "Have pity on me, dearest one, and at the same time on yourself; have pity on our children, whom you yourself behold. Let not those whom the illustrious lineage of our family has made noble be subjected to servile condition. Let not I be subjected to an unworthy and shameful marriage while my husband lives -- I who always boasted among my contemporaries of my Saturus. God knows that you will do this unwillingly, which perhaps some have done voluntarily." To whom he replied with the voice of holy Job: "You speak as one of the foolish women. I would fear, woman, if the bitter sweetness of this life were the only one. You are employed as the instrument of the devil's wife; if you loved your husband, you would never drag your own man to the second death. Let them take away the children, separate the wife, remove the property; and keeps his faith secure in my Lord's promises, I will hold to his words: 'If anyone does not leave wife, children, fields, or house, he cannot be my disciple.'" What more? When the woman departed with her children, rejected, Saturus was strengthened for the crown, was examined, stripped, crushed by punishments, and dismissed as a beggar. He was forbidden access to go out; they took everything from him, yet the robe of baptism they could not take away.